“Sweetheart, do you mind if I look?” I ask, gesturing to her neck.
Her shaking fingers grasp the edge of her turtleneck collar and gently pull it down. The bite is slightly purple around the edges, but it’s not bleeding, and it looks clean. Still, I’ve seen unplanned bites before. You can’t just bond with someone and then walk away. Most purposeful bonds require both people to stay in close proximity for the first few weeks—otherwise, the bond can have horrible side effects.
“How do you feel?” I ask, though I already know. I thought she was shaking because she was upset when I first saw her. Now I see it’s a symptom—of bonding sickness.
“I feel sick,” she nearly whispers. “I haven’t slept. I can’t—” She cuts off and leans her back against the counter as though she can’t even hold herself upright.
Without thinking, I sit down on the floor, reach forward, and pull her, and the dog, into my lap. She gasps but doesn’t pull away, and when I manage to dredge my rusty, extinct purr out from the depths of my chest, her eyes go wide.
Her whole body melts into that sound, and I have to shift her a little so she doesn’t feel my hardening knot at the contact of her soft body against mine. For a moment, we just sit there, breathing, being together. Miss Heart’s face nuzzles into the space between my pecs.
“It’s gonna be okay, Sweetheart,” I promise her—and fuck anything that tries to make a liar out of me.
“I feel like my insides are being torn out,” she confesses. “I don’t know where I start and he ends. I just—”
Before she can finish, she convulses in my arms. A bond sicknessseizure.
“Fuck! Winnie!” I yell, fruitlessly. I dump the pup off her lap and run out to my cruiser. Gently—careful with her head—I strap her into the back seat so she can lie across it. Deputy jumps in and lies down on the floor, clearly deciding he’s not leaving her.
The drive from her cottage to the nearest hospital is a blur of sirens and red lights. Nurses rush her away, and a doctor says they have her. Then I’m left in the waiting room feeling as helpless as a child.
But I’m not fucking helpless. I know what I need to do.
I don’t want to—hell, Ireallydon’t—but for Winnie, I’d do anything.
Gage
Seeing my packmate clutch his stomach in the middle of our hotel room just underscores how fucked we are. “Are you sure you don’t remember anything that might lead us to this girl? Name, hometown, street?” I press Zeke for the hundredth time since he woke up this morning after passing out.
“Work?” Elias asks, unhelpfully, his skull-patterned ski mask covering the bottom of his face and muffling the word.
Zeke shakes his head. Brown, floppy hair mussed. Big, dark circles ring his eyes, and his normally pale skin looks even paler. “Nothing. I was in rut and drunk, man. She was clearly edging into heat. Once we realized what we’d done, she bolted.” He groans like he’s been punched and curls even farther into himself. The bite mark at the base of his neck is a bruised purple.
“If we don’t fucking find her, then you’re both dead. You do get that, right?” I growl.
“Nah, Gage. He missed it the first five times you told him,” Rafe replies in his usual entertained drawl.
Ass.
Rafe leans against the wall, flicking his Zippo lighter on and off—his only tell that he’s not as calm and amused as he pretends. A stress habit.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. I answer on reflex, too distracted to check the caller ID. “What?” I snap.
“That’s how you answer the fucking phone?” The gruff voice on the other end makes me freeze.
I’m about to hang up on the bastard.
“Fuck you,” I say—but just as my thumb twitches to end the call, his next words make me stay.
“How’s Zeke doing?”
I look to Zeke—still miserable on the floor—then to Elias, who quirks an eyebrow, and to Rafe, who’s stopped flicking his lighter and is watching me with a concerned expression.
“Like you give a shit,” I spit into the phone. I don’t know how he knows about Zeke, and I don’t care. Gideon Corbin’s been gone. He doesn’t have anything to do with our pack anymore.
Even if a small part of me is relieved to hear his voice.
Corbin’s deep sigh has my alpha bristling. “I know where the omega is.”
